Resurrection Mall available now from Down & Out Books.
Look for the newest Nick Forte novel, Bad Samaritan, in January, also from Down & Out Books.

One Bite at a Time

Monday, September 21, 2015

Why Bouchercon?

My first Bouchercon
was 2008 in Baltimore. I’d heard of it—no avoiding it if one follows crime fiction
at all—but I’m a solitary sort who doesn’t care for crowds (read: anti-social),
so I never took much interest. Living halfway between DC and Baltimore, it
seemed tis would be the one to try, if I were ever going to. Now I love
conferences, and would go to half a dozen a year if I didn’t have that damn
“real job” that pays the mortgage, electricity, gas, car, food, clothing; you
know how that goes. My affection for conferences in general stems from that
first year at Bouchercon, which is the gold standard for its ability to bring
together a critical mass of readers and authors.

My favorite
Bouchercon stories still belong to Baltimore. As noted above, I’m a bit anti-social
awkward meeting new people, don’t care much for crowds, and found myself that
first morning overwhelmed by hundreds of people, only one of whom I’d ever met
in the flesh. (Austin Camacho, who was a great comfort that first day, taking
the time to chat with me while I was still making up my mind whether to stick
around.) I was supposed to get together with some people I’d met online, but
that was only half a step removed. In my mind, they were writers and I was (at
that time) but a reader (in my mind), and felt an implied chasm between us.

Among those was
Irish author Declan Hughes, creator of the outstanding Ed Loy series. I’d
interviewed him for New Mystery Reader
several months earlier, and he’d invited me to say hello. So there I was in the
men’s room, standing at a urinal, still undecided about how long before I’d go
home, and I look to my left and see a familiar face three stalls over. The
conversation went like this:

Me: You’re Declan
Hughes, aren’t you?

Him: Aye.

Me: I’m Dana King.

Him: Dana! Great to
see you.

Me: Finish up.
We’ll shake later.

We then made of
great show of washing our hands before shaking. On the way out we had to pass
through the line for the ladies’ room. One woman recognized Declan and said, “I
never meet anyone like that in the rest room.” To which I replied, “You’re not
hanging out in the right places.”

That was great fun,
but even someone of my limited social skills knew not to attach myself like a
barnacle to Declan for the rest of the day. By mid-afternoon my enthusiasm was
waning again, until I happened onto Peter Rozovsky on the skyway between
hotels. Peter and I became acquainted through his outstanding blog Detectives Beyond Borders, and had met in
person earlier that day. (Peter’s fame is now beyond borders itself, thanks to
his coming up with the idea for Noir at the Bar.) (Note to those in the DC region: E.A. Aymar is hosting a N@B event at the Wonderland Ballroom, Saturday, October 3 at 7:00. The stalwart lineup includes Austin Camacho, Jen Conley, Nik Korpon, Peter Rozovsky (the Godfather himself), David Swinson, Art Taylor, and Sarah Weinman. And me, but don;t let that stop you. You can always go to the bathroom when it's my turn.) Our chat went like this:

Peter: Scott! Come
here, I have someone for you to meet. (Scott Phillips comes over.) Scott, this
is Dana King, Dana, Scott wrote The Ice
Harvest.

Me (in fan boy
mode, having seen the movie and read the book): I know.

We shook hands and
chatted for five minutes before Scott had to leave for a panel. My comfort
level increased exponentially and I was hooked on the conference experience.

(Epilog to that story:
The next year, in Indianapolis, I was hanging on the periphery of the bar,
having lost some of my hard-won confidence over the past twelvemonth. I saw
Scott with some people and was deciding whether to re-introduce myself when he
spotted me. “Hey, Dana. We’re about to go to get something to eat. Do you want
to come?” Bouchercon doubts cured forever. Scott Phillips is a true
humanitarian.)

I had to miss San
Francisco and St. Louis for reasons beyond my control. (Still bummed about St.
Louis, which is one of my favorite towns.) Sat on my first panel in Cleveland,
my second in Albany (moderated by Peter Rozovsky, thus completing that whole Bouchercon
Circle of Life™ thing), went to the Shamus banquet as a nominee in Long Beach,
and have a panel next month in Raleigh. (As well as Author Speed Dating, which
shows how much I’ve come around on that whole talking to strangers thing.) Lord
willing and the creeks don’t rise, I’ll be in New Orleans, Toronto, and St.
Petersburg. Bouchercon is my primary social/creative event of the year, and I
work budgets and vacations around it.

I still remember
Baltimore vividly. So, if anyone who reads this is going to their first—or
second, or third, or…--Bouchercon and feels at all uncomfortable abut speaking
to an author (or at least someone who thinks of himself as one), please say
hello if you see me. I’ll be happy to talk, and will have a few books on hand
to dispense free gratis (as Al Swearengen would say) if you mention this blog
post. If you don’t see me, or I’m otherwise occupied, say hello to The Beloved
Spouse, who will talk to anybody. She has no standards at all. She married me,
didn’t she?

9 comments:

Come see me. I promise to introduce you to at least a couple of other people.

For what it's worth, writing has made this much easier for me,. When in doubt, I think "What would Nick Forte do in this situation?" and do a little role playing. Works every time, and I have't beaten or shot anyone yet. (Nick is apparently on his best behavior when I channel him.)

In addition, volunteering is a great way to meet people and it gives you something to do, plus it helps everyone. Even if you only volunteer for 1 hour that is a win win for everyone. I have found so many friends and new authors this way.

I had a built-in gang of peeps at that Baltimore Bouchercon, which was also my first one, people I had a met a few months before at Noircon in Philadelphia (Scott Phillips was one of them.) But what I say to anyone worried or shy or who doesn't know anyone is that if you read a good book, you'd get excited and want to tell your friends or colleagues, but maybe they don't read much, or they don't share your interest in crime fiction. At Bouchercon, you're with 1,500 people with whom you have at least one interest in common and will know what you're talking about. So jabber away.

Lots of ways to order Res Mall

Worst Enemies, Book 1 of the Penns River series

Click the cover to buy

Grind Joint, Book 2 of the Penns River series

Click the cover to buy

Forte 4: A Dangerous Lesson Available Now! Click the image below to purchase.

Chicago Private Investigator Nick Forte’s official task is to find out what he can about Jennifer Vandenbusch’s new suitor, who fails to measure up in the eyes of the family matriarch, Jennifer’s grandmother. This seems par for the course for Forte, as his personal life has been leading him through a series of men who treat women badly, though none nearly as badly as the Thursday Night Slasher. Forte lives on the fringes of the investigation run by his old friend Sonny Ng until elements of Forte’s case and life dovetail with the Slasher investigation, leading to Forte discovering more about the crimes—and himself—than he wanted to know.

The Man in the Window

"...we see him getting rougher, tougher and darker book by book. There are multiple twists in the end, two cool sidekicks, good action scenes and some pretty nifty Chanderlisms in this book, adding up to a perfect PI read"--Sons of Spade blog

The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of (Nick Forte 2)

It's a kind of authorial magic that The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of works as a tribute and as a story, and that neither aspect interferes in the least with the other… I can imagine this book finding its way into a class on writing crime fiction as an example of how to pay tribute to one's predecessors while at the same time writing a story that can stand on its own. It's an impressive accomplishment.--- Peter Rozovsky, Detectives Beyond Borders, December 18, 2014

About Me

Two of my Nick Forte Private investigator novels (A SMALL SACRIFICE and THE MAN IN THE WINDOW) received nominations for Shamus Awards. I also write a series of police procedurals set in the economically depressed town of Penns River PA, published by Down & Out Books. A non-fiction essay, “Chandler’s Heroes,” appeared in Spinetingler Magazine online in October of 2013.
I live in Laurel MD with The Beloved Spouse.